Royal Tourists, Colonial Subjects and the Making of a British World, 1860-1911

Royal tourists, colonial subjects and the making of a British world, 1860-1911 examines the ritual space of nineteenth-century royal tours of empire and the diverse array of historical actors who participated in them. The book is a tale of royals who were ambivalent and bored partners in the project of empire; colonial administrators who used royal ceremonies to pursue a multiplicity of projects and interests or to imagine themselves as African chiefs or heirs to the Mughal emperors; local princes and chiefs who were bullied and bruised by the politics of the royal tour, even as some of them used the tour to symbolically appropriate or resist British cultural power; and settlers of European descent and people of colour in the empire who made claims on the rights and responsibilities of imperial citizenship and as co-owners of Britain's global empire. Royal tourists, colonial subjects and the making of a British world suggests that the diverse responses to the royal tours of the nineteenth century demonstrate how a multi-centred British imperial culture was forged in the empire and was constantly made and remade, appropriated and contested. In this context, subjects of empire provincialised the British Isles, centring the colonies in their political and cultural constructions of empire, Britishness, citizenship and loyalty. The book will be read by scholars and post-graduate students of Britain, empire and royalty as well as lay readers interested in the history of royalty and the British Empire.

Charles V. Reed is Associate Professor of History at Elizabeth City State University